REVIEWS 603 producers and of providers of labour; they want the requisite capacity; the credit, and means of accurate information which are indispensable to direct a proper supply of labour towards the market where it is in demand. This view has been defended long ago by M. de Molinari, who, to bring it into practical application, started the idea of the Paris Bourse du Travail, unhappily now a focus of petty political agitation. Yet he does not despair, for he is convinced that ' every time that an operation corresponds to a want and is able to yield a profit, the agency of natural law develops the creation of the suitable organ.' When this intermediate agent is developed, when publicity is enlisted in the service of labour, as it is in the service of capital, the price of labour will be determined in an impersonal way according to the general fluctuations of supply and demand, just as the prices of the loan of capital and of the staple articles of consumption are determined, and the actual state of hostility will come to an end. Eleven years ago, in a contribution to the Revue du Mouvement Social, M. de Molinari sketched out the plan on which such agencies might be organized. He recommends the foundation of free and independent joint-stock com- panies, whose branch establishments covering the whole area of the civilized world, would, on payment of a small percentage on the amount of his wages, assist the workman in all the circumstances of his life (military service, railway journeys, payment of taxes, saving-banks, &c.), and even grant hiln, with due caution, occasional advances on the future remuneration of his work. But, true to his leading principle, M. de Molinari would not allow the State to take this service in its hands. But, for all this, M. de Molinari is far from believing that there can be any such thing as a panacea for all social and economical disorders: he expressly maintains that, when we shall have realized the regimen which is adapted to the present state of society, new deficiencies will be discovered and call for new remedial developments. In the third part, the Programme Economique, M. de Molinari sums up the amount of progress which has been reached in the arts of production and of destruction or defence, and points to the other reforms which ought now to be carried, such as the abolition of customs duties, house taxes, the insurance against the risk of war by the constitution of a League of Neutrals, and the simplification of the State reduced to its proper functions of preserver of public and private security. This programme is entirely founded on the unrestrained agency of natural laws, and consequently is in thorough opposition to the Socialistic programmes which start from the denial of the existence of such laws. I have sought to give, in these few words, a sketch of the main outlines of a work singularly well connected and full of accurate reasoning, which, though opposed to some of the prevailing tendencies of the day, invites careful study and research, and deserves to be re- commended to all who are interested in the greatest problem of our time. E. CASTELOT
